


A Rumor of Skin

by GoodGollyMissYollie (Yollie183)



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Civil War (Marvel), M/M, Medical Procedures, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-06-04 22:09:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6677323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yollie183/pseuds/GoodGollyMissYollie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Bucky felt cold, even in his dreams."</p>
<p>*** contains MAJOR spoilers for Captain America: Civil War ***</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Rumor of Skin

**Author's Note:**

> So, I went to see Civil War today! (Well done to South Africa, deciding to release a movie with the words 'civil war' in the title on Freedom Day)
> 
> Please don't read if you haven't seen it yet, I spoil literally everything.

Bucky felt cold, even in his dreams.

 

He dreamed of Brooklyn. He dreamed of Leipzig. He dreamed of his mother dancing with Rebecca to a song on the radio, their giggles when Becca nearly tripped over a kitchen chair. He dreamed of a kid in a ridiculous red and blue suit, cracking jokes as he kicked Bucky’s ass.

Most of all, he dreamed of Steve. Steve, tiny and pale, shivering under a threadbare coat. Steve kissing Sharon Carter. Steve jumping across a fiery chasm to save Bucky. Steve going to war against his team, his _friends,_ for Bucky.

 

There were nightmares too. Tony Stark’s face, Zemo’s voice saying those words. There were people in his nightmares. Broken, bleeding people, extending their arms toward him, their dead sunken eyes full of blame. In his nightmares they screamed, whispered, sobbed, muttered the same words, over and over.

 

_You did this. You broke us. You killed us. This is your fault. You are a murderer. You are a monster. You are a weapon, and nothing else, you will never be human again…_

Bucky knew they were telling the truth. He had acted, for Steve to be happy. He had smiled, said the right words, all of it. But Bucky was empty. There was a great black hole where his personhood used to be.

It had come as a relief when T’Challa offered to put him under again. He’d accepted gratefully, hoped that they would leave him there forever. That he would die with civilization, unaware that the end was coming until it grew warmer and his dreams faded and he could go to Hell where he belonged.

 

So, in the cold, Bucky dreamed, good dreams and bad, until it grew warmer and his dreams faded and he opened his eyes to find he was not in Hell after all. He was lying in a warm bed. Above him, Steve’s face loomed, frowning and bruised.

 

“Did you pick a fight again, Stevie?” Bucky muttered, his mind still foggy and sluggish.

Steve smiled, his eyes crinkling in the corners. “You should’ve seen the other guy.”

“Knowing you, he probably walked away without a scratch,” Bucky said, a little clearer this time. He pushed himself up into a sitting position, the movements awkward without his left arm. Steve attempted to help, but a sharp glance dissuaded him.

“Why am I awake?” Bucky asked once he was comfortable.

“There’s a situation,” Steve said, eyes averted.

“What kind of situation?”

Steve rubbed his eyes. “People are disappearing. Enhanced people. People associated with the Avengers. We need you.”

“Steve, you know it isn’t safe. Anyone could flip the switch,” Bucky tapped his temple, “and I go off the rails.”

“Well, I could disable that switch, you know, if that’s something you’d want to consider.”

Bucky’s head snapped to the door. Tony Stark was leaning against the doorframe, a screwdriver in his hands.

“Tony thinks he has a way to get rid of the conditioning,” Steve supplied when Bucky turned a shocked gaze on him.

“He’d just as soon kill me,” Bucky said, looking back at Stark.

Tony’s expression was pleasant, but his eyes were cold.

“Nope.” Stark twirled the screwdriver, nearly dropping it.

Bucky smirked. “No one’s that forgiving.”

“Oh, this isn’t absolution, MK, this is desperation. Our last resort.”

Stark turned on his heel and left.

“No,” Bucky said before Steve could open his mouth.

Steve frowned. “Buck, Tony won’t do anything to hurt you.”

“Steve, this is a bad idea. Just put me back in the ice.”

“Buck, please, we need you,” Steve said. He widened his eyes, his lips forming a half pout. He looked like a ridiculously overgrown puppy.

Bucky sighed. “Fine.”

Steve grinned, moving to sit on the end of Bucky’s bed. “Thanks, pal.”

“Why did Stark call me MK?”

Steve shrugged. “It’s probably some pop-culture reference. The guy’s full of ‘em.”

“It was a reference to MK-Ultra, actually.” Stark’s head appeared in the doorway.

“Were you eavesdropping?” Steve asked.

“Yes. Now let’s get to work, Elsa,” Stark replied, nodding toward Bucky.

“Elsa?” Bucky questioned, but Steve was beaming.

“I understood that reference!”

“Congratulations,” Stark said sarcastically, as he disappeared again.

Bucky shook his head. This was not going to end well.

Bucky got up from his bed, really looking around for the first time. He was in a bedroom with a large bed, bedside tables and a chair in the corner, all done in shades of cream and black. He stepped toward the floor to ceiling windows and gaped. The view was incredible. The building seemed to sit on a cliff overhang, with a snaking river hundreds of feet below, mountains on every side. And there, right in front of Bucky, carved from black stone and shining in the midday sun, a panther. It was the size of an ocean liner, snarling, almost alive.

Bucky felt Steve’s sleeve brush his arm as he came to stand next to him.

They stood in silence for several long seconds, then Steve let out a sigh.

“Come on, we shouldn’t keep Tony waiting.”

Bucky nodded, following him out into the hallway and through a set of doors into a lab.

Stark was sitting on one of the long counters that ran the length of the room, fiddling with a small black gadget. He looked up when they walked toward him, setting the gadget down and hopping off the counter.

“Let’s get to work.”

 

Two hours later, Bucky was still sitting on a stool, waiting for Stark to finish taking his measurements. They’d now spent nearly an hour on just his right arm.

“Are you done yet?” Bucky shifted uncomfortably. Cryostasis didn’t do much for muscle tone and sitting still for so long was causing cramps along his calves, thighs and back.

“It’ll go a lot quicker if you stop fidgeting,” Stark snapped, tapping the screen of his Stark Pad to reset the scanners on a specific part of Bucky’s forearm.

“I thought we were doing something about the brainwashing, not fitting me for a new outfit or whatever the fuck you’re doing.”

“Watch your language,” Stark said smoothly.

Bucky was tempted kick Stark’s shin.

“How’s this helping the brainwashing though?” he insisted.

“It’s not. I need to input the design so we can start fabricating your new arm. Multitasking and all that jazz.” Stark said all this as if it should be obvious and Bucky was too slow to get it.

“You’re building me a new arm?”

“New, better, cooler,” Stark frowned down at the Stark Pad as he spoke.

“Why?” Bucky was flabbergasted.

Stark just shrugged.

Bucky looked to Steve for an explanation, but the intrepid Captain America was snoozing in his chair, mouth open, drooling a little.

Bucky’s chest tightened, but he smiled at the sight.

“Alright, Elsa,” Stark said and Bucky shifted his attention back to him. “This is all done. We can get started on the real work now.”

Bucky nodded.

“How do you feel about needles?” Stark asked, looking at Bucky with narrowed eyes.

“No feeling in particular, why?”

“I need to implant a tiny electronic device.”

“Where?” Bucky knew he was going to regret asking.

“Inside your brain.”

Bucky did regret asking. At the thought of yet more intrusion into his brain, his blood had run cold. He clenched his fist at his side, his nails breaking the skin of his palm.

“And if I say no?”

Stark shrugged. “A lot of our friends may die. More people if their abilities are somehow replicated or if they are conditioned of controlled.”

Bucky huffed out a breath.

“There’s no other way?”

“No.”

“What does it do?”

Stark pulled up a screen. It showed a diagram of a human brain.

“The device sits here,” Stark indicated the frontal lobe, “and it transmits information. It can let you put your memories up on a screen to watch. But it only works one way. You can project, but you can’t change memories or implant new ones.”

“And this will help me how?”

“You can sort through your memories, work through trauma… and permanently suppress certain things.”

“Suppress?”

Stark made a little hand gesture.

“The device can emit a slight electric current that _cauterizes_ specific neural pathways. Like the pathways created by the conditioning that allow a random string of words to turn you into a mindless death-robot.”

“And when it’s done? When the conditioning is burned out of my brain,

what does your device do then?”

“It stays in your head, allows you to work through whatever trauma you may have. Or I remove it.”

Bucky looked at Steve, who was now snoring lightly.

“Fine.”

Stark nodded. He busied himself at the counter and Bucky stared at Steve.

It had been a long day for Bucky. He could feel his eyelids getting heavier. He’d so hoped to disappear from life. To not be given the responsibility of trying not to hurt the one person he cared about. Even with Stark’s master plan, chances are that Bucky would fuck up. Hurt someone, kill someone. It was all he knew how to do anymore. Fight, hurt, kill, repeat. Over and over until nothing else existed. Bucky realized that with Stark’s implant, he’d be expected to relive the worst memories, the ones that rattled their cages in the early mornings when sleep and the sun eluded him. Bucky was scared of those memories. But what if the implant didn’t work, and he lost the good memories? Bucky knew the answer to that, at least. A bullet. Steve would be upset, but Bucky would rather die than go back to being _less._

“How long was I in the ice?” he asked Stark abruptly, not sure why the question didn’t occur earlier.

“Eight months.”

Bucky nodded. It wasn’t that long at all. He’d thought maybe a couple of years.

“Alright, Jimmy, let’s roll.”

Bucky frowned at Stark. “Please don’t call me that. Rather stick to Elsa.”

“Yeah, fine, whatever.” Stark pulled on rubber gloves.

“If you need to implant the device in my frontal lobe…” Bucky trailed off.

“The needle goes in through your eye socket, yes.”

Bucky swallowed.

Stark picked up a large silver syringe.

“Should I be laying down for this?”

Stark gave a little smirk. “Is the big, scary super-assassin scared of a tiny wittle needle?”

Bucky scowled at him. “No.”

“Then open wide, darlin’.”

Bucky huffed again. Then he tilted his head back, staring unblinkingly at a spot on the ceiling.

Stark was mercifully quick. Bucky’s pain tolerance was high, due to years of torture, but it was still an unpleasant experience.

Stark gave Bucky a tissue when he’d removed the needle.

Bucky blinked rapidly, wiping up the moisture that ran down his cheek.

_Tears,_ his brain supplied, finally. It happened sometimes, that he’d have a hard time finding a human word, instead of a clinical or technical term for something.

“You might have headaches for a couple of days,” Stark said, pulling off the gloves. “I had, anyway.”

“You have an implant?” Bucky asked, surprised.

“How else was I supposed to test it?”

“Good point.”

Just then a loud snore erupted from Steve, and he jerked awake.

“Good morning, sunshine,” Stark said drily.

Bucky watched Steve rub his eyes. There would be no turning back now. He was in this till the end of the line.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to send me a prompt, request a fic or share feelings about the movie, find me on twitter at [yollie183](https://twitter.com/Yollie183)
> 
> Please leave a comment (or criticism), since they sustain me...


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